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Monday, April 15, 2013

Deadly Bombings

In the last 24 hours, there were bombings in Boston, Baghdad, Kirkuk, and Nasariyah. At least 33 people were killed and 300 wounded.

No one has claimed responsibility for any of the bombings so far.

When I stopped writing about guns, I think it was due to a sudden clarity about violence in the USA. I cannot claim any great intuition about Iraq, since I have never been there.
However, when writing about Newtown, it quickly became crystal clear that guns were here to stay and any laws that were passed would not restrict guns in any meaningful way. Indeed, it was suddenly clear that in a society where there are so many guns and which now allows most of its citizens to carry concealed weapons, that Mr. LaPierre of the NRA was actually correct when he opined that the only way to make schools safe is to have armed guards.

Our future would be a future of armed guards. Here I sit tonight watching the NBC News ( a rare event ) and one of the main topics is how to provide security for public events, and I sense that one part of the response will be more armed guards.

Baghdad

I realized that the rest of my life would be lived in a society that thinks it can control "irrational" violence through the just exercise of "rational" violence. I think what I saw clearly was that violence, whether rational or irrational, justified or unjustified, feeds off itself and grows exponentially.

And we are never to escape it now.

Just look at the Gun Control law which is not a beginning, but sounds more like an end, a souvenir of a moment of morality thrown to the people of Newtown.
And there are attempts by these same lawmakers to allow people who have a license to carry a concealed weapon in one state to be able to go into any other state carrying that same concealed weapon.

How fascinating that gun people think it perfectly acceptable to overextend the power of the government and trample on the states' laws when it comes to their guns - a perfect example of gun fascism which has infiltrated everywhere in our lives.
(This has nothing to do with hunting. Gun conversation in the USA is incredibly complex. The stridency of the discourse has nothing to do with hunting, a perfectly acceptable pursuit.)

I am so sorry for those people who have been killed and wounded, and I extend my condolences to their families.